Rail transit officials in California’s Bay Area have been ordered to pay more than $7 million to transit workers who were fired because they refused to get a COVID-19 vaccine years ago.On Oct. 23, a federal jury in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California sided with six former San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) workers who had refused to get the vaccine for religious purposes.
About a week ago, the federal jury also determined that BART had failed to prove that it suffered an undue hardship by denying accommodations to the ex-employees in the case.
On Oct. 23, the jury further found that the six employees met the burden of showing that there was a conflict between their religious beliefs and the BART vaccine mandate, which was implemented in 2021.
According to the law firm, the jury also agreed with the figures that the plaintiffs had provided for lost wages that they had suffered after losing their jobs. The jury then added $1 million each to those figures, the firm said, describing the verdict as a “legal earthquake.”
“The rail employees chose to lose their livelihood rather than deny their faith. That in itself shows the sincerity and depth of their convictions,“ Kevin Snider, the Pacific Justice Institute’s chief counsel, who served as lead trial attorney, said. ”After nearly three years of struggle, these essential workers feel they were heard and understood by the jury and are overjoyed and relieved by the verdict.”
The law firm stated: “During the trial, jurors heard compelling testimony from dedicated employees. One of the plaintiffs had worked for more than 30 years for BART, with a stretch of 10 years perfect attendance, before being unceremoniously dismissed. Another had been out on workers comp for months, with no scheduled return date, when she was fired.”
Lawyers for BART argued that multiple employees who had conflicts with receiving the vaccine had secular—rather than religious—reasons. But the jury disagreed with those arguments, the Pacific Justice Institute said.
The vaccine mandate was approved by BART’s board of directors in October 2021 and stipulated that all employees must get the COVID-19 vaccine. It allowed some employees to be exempt from the vaccine, including for religious reasons.
A year later, BART employees filed a class-action lawsuit accusing the operator of denying religious accommodations in violation of state law.
“Plaintiffs’ putative class fails because its members have little in common beyond their request for religious accommodation,” the judge further said in his order. “They do not share a common religious objection. They do not share a vocation or a set of contractual rights. They do not present a similar set of potential accommodations and associated burdens. They do not present similar health and exposure concerns.
“Potential accommodations do not impact the same pool of coworkers. Those coworkers do not have the same bargained-for rights.”
